NOTE: It is HIGHLY recommended that this video be downloaded, not viewed in Preview mode, if you wish to see everything there is to see, the way it is meant to be seen.

The Kingdom of L.F.S. is based on the trailer for Knights of Badassdom featured at San Diego Comic-Con 2011. Being a big fan of this type of thing (although as for LARPing, I've actually never done that), I quickly became convinced that this would make a great foundation for an AMV. My first choice of anime was actually Angel Beats, but after scrubbing through several episodes of that series, I wasn't happy with the footage I found; it was doable, but it was missing that outrageous, self-mocking, tongue-in-cheek attitude that I saw in the Badassdom trailer. So Advent Children it was, and everything went great up until the trailer shifted gears around midpoint and there was suddenly a mad scramble to shift AC with it. I am not entirely happy with the result, but I'm not easy to please, either, so there you go.

I would encourage anyone who watches this AMV to view the Badassdom trailer; it's a great one and some of the cast I matched up with Advent Children characters should be amusing. It also shows what's really going on behind the audio, since AC could in no possible way ever duplicate the trailer's content. Which brings me to a very important point: this is not meant to be a cookie-cutter AMV trailer. If anything, it's a parody OF a trailer.

A note about the title of this AMV "The Kingdom of L.F.S." originates from Sephiroth's sarcastic remark early on in the video, when he informs Cloud (who suspects - and rightly so - that he's getting screwed over again): " 'Tis the Kingdom of Elefess, my naive friend!", except that Sephiroth spells it "L.F.S." and is not referencing a place, but rather a thing.

Software Used & Some Comments on the Special Effects:Adobe Premiere Pro, After Effects and Photoshop did most of the heavy lifting, with a tiny bit of help from Illustrator. If you're curious about how this video was made and want to know more about its special effects, check out this Lip Flapper interview in the forums.

It was not my original plan to get bogged down in special effects, but I really underestimated the amount of work involved in getting Advent Children to cooperate - about 80 hours of hardcore editing and 150 hours of effects work. I also have a habit of tinkering with things until they're as close to the way I want them as possible (and screwing things up the first three times around). Subtlety is the name of the game, here, and subtle, invisible "effects" can be just as time consuming (if not more) than over-the-top effects. If you do not notice some of the things I did to try and pull this AMV together, then I consider that a job very well done. And speaking of subtle effects...

Yes, Virginia, you can lip synch Advent Children.

Many thanks to the people who patiently helped out as beta testers and offered up ideas and critique: Amo-Chan, CorpseGoddess, Emong, Knowname, machina21 and Melichan923. This AMV reflects their input, and I really appreciate their support and interest!